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Michigan Issues Advisory Bulletin on Marijuana Testing

Today, Michigan’s Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs (LARA) released an Advisory Bulletin regarding testing points for marihuana and marihuana infused products. As with all of LARA’s Advisory Bulletins, this announcement provides advance notice of what LARA intends to include in emergency rules that will be issued to implement the State’s new Medical Marihuana Facilities Licensing Act (MMFLA). We continue to expect those emergency rules to be issued by the early part of November.

Per this Advisory Bulletin, LARA intends to require that products be tested at two points in the supply chain. First, a grower will be required to test marijuana after harvest and before it is transferred to either a processor or a provisioning center. Second, a processor will be required to have products tested after they are in their final form and before they are transferred to a provisioning center. Test results will be recorded in the statewide monitoring system, and growers and processors able to access the results. Provisioning centers will not be allowed to sell marihuana or infused products unless the product has been both tested and labelled.

In addition to the mandatory testing points noted above, growers and processors may choose to have products tested at other stages. Caregivers may also have marijuana or infused products tested, but their products are not entered into the seed-to-sale tracking system.

Left unaddressed by this Advisory Bulletin are a number of critical testing issues that should be covered by the State’s emergency rules. Among these are the contents of labels, batch sizes for testing, the method of sample collection and transport, and, of course, the substances and thresholds for which products must be tested.